Our sources on Bankova confirm: The Office of the President of Ukraine is conducting behind-the-scenes negotiations with the Kremlin regarding a possible summit between Volodymyr Zelensky and Vladimir Putin. The key outlines of future agreements may appear as early as this week - after contacts between the head of the Office of the President of Ukraine Andriy Yermak and a representative of Donald Trump's team, Steve Witkoff.
The situation is complicated by the fact that at this stage Kyiv has not been able to agree on real security guarantees from Western partners. According to the interlocutors, negotiations on a security package have been going on for a long time, but there is no result: neither legally binding agreements, nor clear protection mechanisms.
Instead, the format of support from the West has been reduced to a financial component - loans, grants, and assistance to maintain the economy. This, according to sources, looks like a kind of "compensation" for the lack of strategic guarantees.
Yermak's contacts with Witkoff could be a test of how much the Trump administration is willing to pressure the Kremlin towards negotiations. Bankova is counting on American mediation, but at the same time is wary of a scenario in which Ukraine finds itself in the role of the party forced to make concessions.
The fact that talks about a summit with Putin have begun seems paradoxical against the backdrop of statements about "indestructibility" and "impossibility of compromise." However, insiders admit that without real security guarantees from the West, Bankova is forced to look for other formats.
Thus, the coming week may determine whether Zelensky's talks with Putin will become a reality and in what format they will take place.
